Roberta Sykes
Roberta "Bobbi" Sykes (16 August 1943 - 14 November 2010) was an Australian poet and prose author. She was a life-long campaigner for indigenous land rights, as well as human rights and women's rights.Rights campaigner Bobbi Sykes dies ABC Online (16 Nov 2010) - Retrieved 16 Nov 2010 Life Youth and education Born Roberta Barkley Patterson in Townsville, Queensland, Sykes was raised by her mother and purportedly never knew her father. Sykes says in her autobiography that his identity is unknown, and her mother told her a number of different accounts about her father; variously that he was Fijian, Papuan, African-American, and Native-American.http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/cms/china.pdf Early activism Sykes was, controversially, expelled from school aged 14 and, after a succession of jobs, including a nurses assistant at the Townsville General Hospital from 1959 to 1960. She moved to Brisbane and then to Sydney in the early to mid-1960s where she worked as a strip-tease dancer at the notorious Pink Pussycat Club, 38a Darlinghurst Road, Kings Cross under the stage name, pseudonym of "Opal Stone". She became a freelance journalist and got involved in several national indigenous activist organisations. She was one of the many protestors arrested at the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in July 1972. She was involved in the creation and early development of the Redfern Aboriginal Medical Service, although other participants say that her autobiography exaggerates her role in this. Poetry Sykes's early poetry was published in 1979 in the book Love Poems and Other Revolutionary Acts. The first edition was limited to a thousand copies (with the first 300 numbered and signed). A mass market edition was published in 1988. Her second volume of poetry was published in 1996. In 1981 she ghosted the autobiography of Mum (Shirl) Smith, an indigenous Australian social worker in New South Wales. She won the Patricia Weickert Black Writers Award in 1982. Harvard and later activism Sykes received a PhD in Education from Harvard University in 1983. She was the first black Australian to graduate from a United States university. She returned to Australia where she continued her life as an activist and was appointed to the Nation Review, as Australia's first (presumed) indigenous columnist. In 1994 her role was recognised when awarded the Australian Human Rights Medal. Sykes's 3-volume autobiography Snake Dreaming was published between 1997 and 2000. The first volume won The Age Book of the Year 1997 and the 1998 Nita Kibble Literary Award for women writers. Recognition *1982: Patricia Weickert Black Writers Award *1994: Australian Human Rights Medal *1997: Age Book of the Year for Snake Cradle *1998: National Biography Award for Snake Cradle *1998: Nita B. Kibble Literary Award for Snake Cradle See also * List of Australian poets Publications Poetry *''Love Poems, and other revolutionary actions. Cammeray, NSW: Saturday Centre, 1979; St. Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1989. ISBN 0-7022-2173-2 *Eclipse. St. Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press, 1996. ISBN 0-7022-2848-6 Non-fiction *''Mum Shirl: An autobiography (with Colleen Shirley Perry). Melbourne, 1981. *''Incentive, Achievement and Community: An analysis of Black viewpoints on issues relating to Black Australian education''. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1986. *''Black Majority''. Hawthorn, Vic: Hudson, 1989. ISBN 0-949873-25-X *''Murawina: Australian Women of High Achievement''. Sydney & New York: Doubleday, 1993. ISBN 0-86824-436-8 *''Snake Dreaming: Autobiography of a black woman''. (3 volumes), St. Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1997-2000. **''Snake Cradle''. 1997. ISBN 1-86448-513-2 **''Snake Dancing''. 1998. ISBN 1-86448-513-2 **''Snake Circle''. 2000. ISBN 1-86508-335-6 Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:Roberta Sykes, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Mar. 15, 2015. See also * List of Australian poets References External links ;Poems *"racism / many faces" * Roberta Sykes (1944c.-2010) in the Australian Poetry Library (43 poems). ;Audio / video *Roberta Sykes at YouTube ;About *"'Black power' activist and author had ASIO spooked" obituary, Sydney Morning Herald * An analysis of the controversy about her identity Category:1943 births Category:2010 deaths Category:Australian poets Category:Harvard University alumni Category:Australian indigenous rights activists Category:Australian women's rights activists Category:Australian women writers Category:Australian biographers Category:Australian human rights activists Category:20th-century poets Category:20th-century women writers Category:English-language poets Category:Poets Category:Women poets